Ian Mac Donald
This week, Bob talks with Iain Mac Donald, founder of Skillpages – a million-person social network unlike any other. From one point of view SkillPages is all about turning what you do – and the skills you used to do it – into search engine findable pages and letting people interested in those skills tap their social network for advice on you.
Finding skilled people, recommended by your friends and their friends, is the flip side of SkillPages. People who have skills – and there’s hundreds of thousands of skills – are getting fanned and those pages are moving up in organic search results. Meanwhile, when people click those results, they realize that by joining they can see what their friends recommend.
Iain walks us through how SkillPages gained a million members in less than six months, building a network-effect startup, a Darwinian approach to the consumer Internet, and how he raised the funds that will let SkillPages tackle monetization next year sometime. SkillPages is Iain’s second startup – having sold his first broadband company for a sweet $100 million, and candidly talks about what’s it like the second time around.
I think the best part of the interview was when Iain explained the details of exactly how he executes – and it’s not what you think – and the excellent Irish startup ecosystem. And, Iain gets into the secret sauce behind SkillPages: The Skill Graph Taxonomy and for dessert, how he finds what to invest in.
Tired of being stuck in neutral in your startup? Why not do a MicroConsult with Bob Walsh? Instead of hypotheticals and too much information, Bob will work with you for an hour via Skype developing 8 to 10 specific todos that will get your startup in gear. Details at 47hats.com.
Download Show #120 here: Show #120 Or if you prefer, Subscribe to the podcast in Apple iTunes.
Bob Walsh blogs at 47Hats, is on Twitter at @bobwalsh or you can email him at bob.walsh@47hats.com.
Patrick Foley blogs at PatrickFoley.com, is on Twitter at @patrickfoley or you can email him at patrick.foley@microsoft.com
Relevant Links:
SkillPages
The SkillPages Blog
Link to slides mentioned: http://www.businessinsider.com/mary-meekers-web-2010-11#-15
Interesting podcast. Really appreciate these empowering stories and insight into the startup world.
Keep up the good work!
Thanks for your contribution to the music industry & community Iain!